Love of a Hero & Heroine
by Kaizer-Kid
Summary: Hercules and Morrigan's musings about love, loss and each other as they rest in a cave after a hard day's labour and toil. Basically their thoughts and feelings in S5E8 before chasing after Dahak, so basically expect some philosophy and some forceful favouring of a particular pairing. No Flames.


Kaizer: This idea occurred to me during the episode 'Darkness Rising' where the Druids die, this idea is occurred when Morrigan ask Herc to stay with her and Brigid, and this idea kind of occurred and with it taking place before he falls asleep, as he compares the various women in his life, from his mother to Xena, to Nemesis, to his wives and how alike and different they are from Morrigan. Just a warning this fic is pretty heavy in HercxMorrigan pairing as it's the only one that made sense to my mind for the hero of the show. Also I don't own squat and Universal Studio owns the show and all its' rights.

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_**Love of a Hero and a Heroine**_

Love was never easy, nor was it ever simple for Hercules. Yet love he often did, all throughout his life he had always felt it easier to just accept that love was the most powerful and most honourable force in the world, accepting that to refuse to love, to trust in humanity's goodness was to live a life he did not want to live, to live while wishing for death and for nothingness.

With Nemesis love was never really the issue, he loved her from when he was ten years old, for she had always protected him, supported him and generally was everything he wanted. Except, love could never be enough as she never could understand his mortal heart, his dislike for the gods and their petty grievances and games, and while he wished to settle down a little, start a family or even meld their lives together, Nemesis had hated the idea of being dependent on someone else, to her it was restraining. So Hercules had to set her free, let her wild spirit remain unrestrained as she left him behind time and again.

And when he fell in love for the second time, it was a bit of a sudden realisation for him, it was overwhelming and caused him to behave foolishly around Deianeira for weeks, as he felt shy, nervous and foolish all at once. Once it was reciprocated, once he realised the depth of her feelings it was liberating, it was absolute, and yet now looking back over the expanse of time, Herc could see that it was also flawed.

Deianeira never could understand darkness within him, pure as she was and innocent as she was despite having seen much, she always believed in good just as much as he used to, and still sometimes did.

She of course supported him, her first instincts being to retire from adventures and to take up the role of a mother, while he aided as many as possible while not venturing too far away, as he tried to spend as much time as possible with his family. Love changed everything, yet Deianeira much as she fulfilled him, completed him at the time. Could not understand his frustrations with his father, his inability to let go of his divinity and the sense of restlessness it awoke in him, which caused him to seek out adventure and to help others when they needed him and how a home set in one place both pleased and bored him and how he longed for Olympus, she also could not understand how he wanted not someone to enable his restlessness, but someone who could match his spirit and who could stand firm against him, as well as alongside him. She could not understand his frustrations with humans and mortals or his temper and his passionate hatred of the gods.

This restlessness in his soul however was usually eased with the sight of his children, three mischievous little centers of his universe who helped him feel as though, he were needed and as though it didn't matter that he didn't belong amongst gods or men, all that mattered was that they loved him, he loved them, he loved their mother, she loved him, and that Hercules and Deianeira did right by their kids by raising them to be the best men and woman they could ever be. Of course it all came crashing down when the gods decided, and where Deianeira could accept her fate and her childrens' fate, Hercules never could bring himself to forigve himself for damning his family, and for letting his love kill them.

As to Serena, beautiful as she was, sublime and kindly as she was, she was his first chance to get away from the realm of gods and the idea of finally putting to rest the war with Hera and Ares had proved too tempting.

Much as Deianeira had failed to understand how capricious the gods could be, Serena was much more his failure, as the love was tainted from the beginning Herc suspected. It had begun with too many sacrifices, too many losses of powers and of friends, as he forced her to give up one life and she, his own. These sacrifices made for a love that blinded them to each other's flaws, to their own desire to shed their destinies and that blinded them both to Ares and Strife, leaving her haunted by her frustrations with her loss of powers and her inability to connect with Iolaus, his mother, his brother and several of his friends as she hated violence in all forms, and all representations whether they were physical, figurative or otherwise, while also having difficulties with humans not understanding just how much Hercules deep down craved the adrenaline rushes the occasional fight gave him and how much he loved and needed humanity.

This was compounded by his own frustrations, his frustration with his lack of strength, her constant need to be protected, to be bundled up and his feelings of inadequacy every time she looked at him in disappointment or like a weeping child and needed to be sheltered like the child she so often seemed like.

_'Speaking of children,'_ Hercules thought with a smile as he gazed at the sleeping Brigid, her pixie like eyes closed and her innocent spirit for once tuckered out after a long day of playing and trouble. _'She is so much like Eylia, always wanting attention and always giving pretty rocks and shellfish found here and there to everyone she cares for. Though Brigid's much quieter and much messier when she's playing in the mud.'_

In Brigid he supposed there was a second chance at fatherhood, Hercules supposed that Mabon would tell him in his usual infuriating (and perfectly correct) way that she was his daughter now, and he her father, and that love made all things natural and simple no matter the person or the situation or blood relation (or lack thereof).

_'She is so different and yet so much like her mother,'_ the Greek demi-god mused as his gaze drifted from the child who had assumed almost at once the position of being his own, had squeezed her way into his heart and redeemed him in his own eyes, to her reckless and oftentimes frustrating mother.

Morrigan was unlike Deianeira and Serena in every way, if anything she was more like Nemesis and Xena, yet different still. Where Deianeira had aspired to be a house-wife, Morrigan felt bored easily and while she could cook, had little passion or interest in it, preferring rawer foods and favouring a good brawl to spinning clothes.

While Serena had always turned to everyone else for support and wisdom, aspiring also to be a housewife but also demanding a house-husband and protector all at once while being easily prone to tears and to neediness, Morrigan hated to rely on others unless they were proven worthy in her eyes, and Hercules suspected she would find any man without darkness to be of little interest to her, he also suspected that she didn't really know how to cry steely as she was.

As for Xena, as similar as she was to Morrigan the two were also different, with the former having a very ordered sense of things, having a certain fear of losing control, believing in cold facts and her mind before anything and anyone else, while Morrigan favoured chaos and spontaneity in her every-day life, whilst thinking with both her mind and heart at the same time in all things both great and small.

While the similarities to Nemesis were a little harder to see, but where Nemesis could never tolerate being told what to do, hated being mentored and had difficulties wrapping her head around humanity, and thus believed herself to need no teachers and guides, and abhorred the idea of demeaning herself. Morrigan stubborn as she was, recognised that she was in dire need of assistance, the new spirit of Justice depended strongly like most people did upon Mabon's wisdom and kindness, but the biggest difference had to be where as unfettered as Morrigan was, she preferred humanity to the gods and her own company, despite her words to the contrary and contrary to Nemesis who kept in touch with some gods such as Aphrodite or Persephone, her over-all fear of commitment meant that she would never allow any man to woo her, to wed her, to wake up in the morning with her, or to properly father Evander. Whereas Morrigan wished for Brigid to have all facets of parental love, from motherly affection and coddling provided by her and paternal love which Cernunos had never properly provided, seemed to like the idea of marriage and seemed ready for a commitment, and seemed more akin to Iolaus about love than Nemesis.

But as different as she was from every other woman he had ever met, Morrigan was more than their equal and had just as much good in her as they did, Herc had seen proof of that during the battle with Cernunos and Caesar, she also had even more darkness and brutality than those other women had.

Like Deianeira she was mother first and human second, refusing to allow anyone to ever so much as glance at her daughter the wrong way to do so again. Like Serena she was still learning, still naive about a great deal and completely trapped between worlds, and like Xena hounded by her darkness and by her own dark deeds, and like Nemesis she was a free-spirit and one who had difficulty letting others near her.

_'And like mother, so stubborn that it's a wonder a monster like Cernunos could ever get her to do anything for him, besides slicing his good for nothing gut open,'_ Hercules thought remembering his much missed and loved mother, as he cursed the god who had done so much evil, who had nearly destroyed the Celts and who had attempted to kill Brigid, all without any remorse.

Which caused him to wonder about Morrigan, caused him to think about her recent shift in treatment towards him; where once she had growled, scowled and verbally abused him, seemingly disgusted with him. She was now completely and totally bewildering, with her flirting, her dirty jokes, her philosophical debates with him, her perfect synchronisation with him and her mind-numbing attractiveness and strange ability to make him feel content, at peace and yet completely alive, inflamed and as though he were ten or twenty years younger, slowly but surely consuming him.

Her offer to stay was attractive, it would at long last put him out of reach of Ares and Hera, would finally allow him some peace and tranquility, for the first time since Deianeira and it would at long last grant him someone who understood him perfectly. Someone who had his touch of the divine and thus felt restless amongst mortals and a tad too passionate for even human, while also having that touch of humanity, that touch of equal potential for good and evil that need to be needed, that need to entrench himself firmly in the ground and to build a home, while also needing to help others and help himself. She was also the first demi-god, the first half-breed who was like the reverse side of a coin to him, the first one to defeat him and the first half-breed who had been treated as such from the very beginning; admired and rejected by mortals, and looked down upon by gods, yet used as a pawn by them as well, just like he was.

Most of all he realised, it would give him, her and give him, to her. He couldn't tell when he had fallen for her, when her crooked grin and flaming hair had captured him so completely that he didn't know whether to curse the gods for hurting her or to thank them abjectly for giving him the chance to know her, to meet her, feeling as though she were placed in the mortal realm specifically for him.

When did Brigid with her beautiful innocence and trusting goodness, and Morrigan with her brash fire and reckless joie de vie so like Iolaus first engulf him?

_'Greece still is home to Iphicles, Jason and my nephew, Iolaus, but I don't want to go back,'_ Hercules realised with a start as he traced Morrigan's face with one finger and then to her hair, noticing not for the first time how similar in colour her hair was to Deianeira except hers had been more auburn while the demi-goddess' was more fiery, which was fitting he knew, given their nature.

What was even more fitting he suspected, was that with all her similarities and differences from his previous lovers, friends like Iolaus and Nebula and family like Alcmene, Jason and Aphrodite, in all their goodness and darkness was that Morrigan would be the one to truly impassion him in such a way for the first time in his life.

If she were to ask him again, he wouldn't know what to do or what to think, he wouldn't know how to answer her, because for the first time in years he'd finally have a child of his own, a woman who was possibly the most perfect match for him, and he'd have a home to call his own in his entire life.

_'But is that what's right? What if there's nobody to stop the gods back home, what if Iphicles, Jason, Chiron and his students, Xena and Iolaus need me or aren't enough?'_ Hercules asked himself as he considered the idea of going back to Greece, the idea of leaving Morrigan and Brigid behind, of setting sail and never seeing them again. It hurt, physically to just consider the notion as a burning awoke in his heart and made its way to his eyes, how could he do that? How could he go back to a life of aimless wandering and referring the petty squabbles of grown men and women who should be mature enough to handle their own stupid problems?

_"You'll do what's in your heart, Hercules, you'll do what's right because we are who we choose to be, and you chose to be and thus are a good man just like Amphitryon was,"_ Alcmene seemed to whisper into his ear, as her second son remembered her gentle smile, her wise eyes and her way of making all problems seem small and make the world and all its evil, seem so much brighter and the words she used to tell him when he was younger, married and filled with doubt.

And suddenly, Herc knew the answer to his question, knew what path he'd choose, and what was right.

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Kaizer: Hope you all liked it, I'm not sure how I feel about it, it's not quite finished as it has two more chapters to go; one for Morrigan and one for Brigid. Now as for the various loves of Herc's life I have always gone with the theory that Deianeira was incredibly influential over him but she struck me as not really getting the gods, she didn't seem to understand just how capricious the Greek gods could be, she also struck me as a little lacking in ambition as all she aspired to was being a house-wife, which was why he tends to adventure about, as he is a born brawler and adrenaline junkie, in the beginning of the first episode and throughout the series it's hinted that though he was home to tuck the kids in and was an excellent parent he tended to be a bit restless and still poking his nose in Zeus, Hera and Ares' business. As for Nemesis though I adore her, she seems to be unwilling to commit to a relationship and favour one night-stands with Herc earlier on, only to later upon having Evander completely break up with Herc, with her shouldering the entirety of the boy's upbringing on her own which shows that though say Xena and Morrigan are independant, they still like to have others around, where Nemesis seems uncomfortable around humans and is still a little attached to the gods, and I can't see her being at odds with Aphrodite or Persephone who are shown continuously to be pretty kind. As for Serena, no offense to the relationship but it really struck me as nothing more than a rebound from Nemesis & more importantly Deianeira, with Serena also being a rebound for the kids, Herc's paternal instincts overcame him and merged with the attraction he felt for her, with him being infatuated more than anything else. She was a damsel pure and simple. Which brings us to Xena, again commitment is the problem, as well as the fact that I think Xena is too orderly, she loves order, loves to keep to plans and has difficulty with spontaneous events and behaviour, which is why I think the relationship couldn't have worked out because Herc needs a little sponatneousness in his life (which is why Iolaus is so awesome). This is why Morrigan is such a perfect love interest for him, like Hercules she's trapped between her divinity and her mortality, shunned and loved by god and mortal alike, yet craving a family just as much. Like him she wants a deep commitment, she wants to build a family, she has a good and darker side to match his, and she brings out through her chaos him out of his shell, much as Iolaus often did, yet unlike Iolaus she is much more passionate and divided, similarly to Herc.

This brings us to the kids, they're influence is understated and underrated by a lot of fans I think, with them being a heavy influence on Hercules and on the women he chooses, Serena and Nemesis were chosen for maternal qualities, Xena due to his inner darkness. But as for the kids, I think they play an indirect influence on his relationship with Brigid whom he seems extremely attached and 'daddyish' with in Season 5. Brigid I think as his 'stepdaughter' or potential one plays a role in revitalising him as a parent, reminding him yes of what he lost but also of the joys of parenthood, of what Alcmene imparted to him and of what he's deep down wanted his entire life; a family.

Now then; please R&R, no flames and up next is Love of a Heroine: Morrigan.


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